It was an eventful weekend throughout the NBA. The Wolves had to wait until Sunday night to get in on the festivities. Losing to the Rockets wasn’t an option, if they wanted to keep any chance of swooping in and stealing the Western Conference 6-seed before the 82-game regular season comes to a close on April 10.

Earlier Sunday, the Denver Nuggets beat the floundering LA Lakers, all but killing LeBron & Co’s chances of making the play-in tournament. With the win, Denver jumped over Utah, who lost to Golden State on Saturday night, and landed in the 5th seed, still 2 games better than Minnesota. That meant the Wolves looked up, after beating Houston, and saw it was the Jazz now sitting above them (by 1.5 games).

Western Conference Standings

1. Phoenix…………… 0.0 GB – clinched
2. Memphis…………. 7.0 GB – clinched
3. Golden State…. 12.5 GB – clinched
4. Dallas…………….. 13.5 GB – clinched
5. Denver…………… 15.5 GB
6. Utah………………. 16.0 GB
7. Minnesota……….. 17.5 GB
8. LA Clippers………. 23.5 GB
9. New Orleans……. 28.0 GB
10. San Antonio…….. 29.0 GB
11. LA Lakers……….. 31.0 GB

Timberwolves Remaining Schedule

The Minnesota Timberwolves have three games remaining and should be favorites to win all three. Both the Spurs and Wizards have losing records and the Bulls could be resting for the playoffs by the season finale.

• 4/5: Washington Wizards (34-44)
• 4/7: San Antonio Spurs (33-45)
• 4/10: Chicago Bulls (45-33)

Nuggets Remaining Schedule

The Denver Nuggets play on all the same nights as the Wolves, through the rest of the schedule. Memphis is the only team remaining on their slate who has a winning record. They’re already slotted into the 2nd seed in the Western Conference.

• 4/5: San Antonio Spurs (33-45)
• 4/7: Memphis Grizzlies (55-23)
• 4/10: Los Angeles Lakers (31-47)

Jazz Remaining Schedule

Here’s where things get a bit more interesting. The 6th seed Utah Jazz are losers in SIX of their last SEVEN games and have one extra contest remaining on their schedule, than the Wolves and Nuggets.

TWO of their opponents (Grizz, Suns) sit atop the Western Conference. Should Utah lose both of those games and Minnesota win on Tuesday and Thursday, the Wolves and Jazz would enter the last day of the regular season (April 10) with the same record.

• 4/5: Memphis Grizzlies (55-23)
• 4/6: Oklahoma City Thunder (23-55)
• 4/8: Phoenix Suns (62-16)
• 4/10: Portland Trailblazers (27-51)

Tiebreakers

The Timberwolves hold the tiebreaker over the Nuggets but not over the Jazz. So finishing with the same record won’t be enough to overtake Utah for the 6th seed.

To avoid the play-in tournament, Minnesota needs to win out. Then, either the Jazz find a way to lose 3 of their last 4 OR the Nuggets lose 2 of their remaining 3. Neither are likely to happen but the Jazz have lost a lot recently and have a pretty hellish schedule remaining, as long as the Suns and Grizzlies aren’t resting key players this week.

Eric Strack | Minnesota Sports Fan

Much like a surprise visit to Dairy Queen after a big 4th-grade flag football win, Gopher fans got a little dessert when their undefeated rivals to the south, the Iowa Hawkeyes, were routed by the Purdue Boilermakers. The defeathering was nationally televised on ABC.

That means the Hawkeyes (3-1) have the same number of Big Ten losses as the Gophers (2-1), though Minnesota is undefeated (2-0) against West teams, while Iowa is now 2-1. For some reason, victory drinks tonight in Dinkytown will taste just a little bit better.

PURDUE UPSETS NO. 2 IOWA, 24-7 ????

The Boilermakers snap the Hawkeyes’ 12-game win streak

David Bell: 11 REC, 240 YDS ???? pic.twitter.com/LW8ghQOtgE

— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) October 16, 2021

Picked off, Purdue.@BoilerFootball can really feel it, now, at No. 2 Iowa. pic.twitter.com/resddaN4Vy

— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) October 16, 2021

Wild Wild West

The Big Ten West has been an absolute roller coaster so far in 2021. Many, myself included, counted the Gophers out when they lost to Bowling Green during non-conference play. Even in the West, where the gap between competition is smaller than ever, I didn’t think it was possible to lose vs an FCS team and recover to play in the Big Ten Championship.

But, it’s quite possible I doubted PJ Fleck when I shouldn’t have. If any team can recover from that type of devastating loss, it’s probably a Fleck-led team that rows through everything, no matter how rough the waters.

Don’t look up now, because it’s been just two games since that embarrassing L vs BGSU and the Minnesota Gophers are riding a two-game Big Ten West winning streak and sitting 2nd in the division standings. Just one Iowa loss away from a chance at the top spot.

Big Ten West standings as of Saturday evening ???? pic.twitter.com/h4aBroCnQE

— Minnesota Sports Fan (@realmnsportsfan) October 16, 2021

Upcoming Schedule

Want some more good news? You’d might as well fill up on it because we all know how quickly karma swings in this state.

Minnesota’s upcoming schedule is one of the easiest in the Big Ten. Over the next three weeks, they will play all Big Ten bottom-dwellers. First the Gophers will welcome (4-2) Maryland Terrapins, whose record looks pretty good. But, they’ve played just two good teams on the season, losing 51-14 to Iowa and 66-17 to Ohio State a week later.

After the “Maryland Season”, PJ Fleck will take his team up to Chicago to play in (3-3) Northwestern’s empty Stadium before coming back to Minneapolis to play (2-5) Illinois. None of those games are sure victories but they’re matchups Minnesota should be favored in.

Iowa gets to think about their first loss over a bye, next week. They’ll take that negative energy out in Madison vs Wisconsin and in Evanston vs Northwestern the next two weeks after, before the Gophers and Hawkeyes meet at Kinnick Stadium on November 13. We’ll see where the standings shake out then.

Eric Strack | Minnesota Sports Fan

Still, they almost took a victory back with them to Minneapolis, only losing on a last second overtime field goal. Classic Minnesota heartbreak. Or was it?

Tough day for the NFC North

The rest of the NFC North played later in the afternoon or evening. First, the Packers were demolished 38-3 by the Saints, in the most shocking upset of the day. Shortly after that score became official, the Lions failed to finish their comeback in San Francisco, falling to the 49ers 41-33. Hey, at least Detroit’s new QB, Jared Goff, finished the game with a better passer rating than spiking the ball every snap.

Passer rating if thrown into the dirt every play: 39.6

Aaron Rodgers passer rating vs Saints today: 32.8 ???? pic.twitter.com/V6AtVFi3hx

— PFF (@PFF) September 12, 2021

The last NFC North team to take the field this weekend was the Chicago Bears, who were in LA to play against the Rams on Sunday Night Football. Andy Dalton was also better than the worst QB of week one, Aaron Rodgers, but the Bears were still blown out on national TV, 34-14.

1st Place Vikings?

And when that score went into the record books, it left the entire division with an 0-1 record to start 2021. But, not all losses are created equally, as my good friend and fellow blogger, B. Heintz pointed out on Twitter, before SNF kicked off.

1st place Vikings? https://t.co/VLIRdks8Jx

— Minnesota Sports Fan (@realmnsportsfan) September 12, 2021

And after further review, my dude was… partially correct. The Minnesota Vikings will start next week as kings of the NFC North but it’s not because they played vs an AFC team. It’s because they lost by the least amount of points, compared to others within the division. What a world.

Ladies and gentleman, your first-place Minnesota #Vikings. They have the best point differential in the NFC North at minus-3. https://t.co/13snnuqL6j

— Chris Tomasson (@christomasson) September 13, 2021

There it is. The Minnesota Vikings are kings of the NFC North after week 1 according to https://t.co/BgCWp6n3Ba. pic.twitter.com/4RKUwLExeh

— Minnesota Sports Fan (@realmnsportsfan) September 13, 2021

Kings of the North.

Eric Strack | Minnesota Sports Fan

Don’t look now, but after winning tonight in the series opener vs the Baltimore Orioles, the Minnesota Twins are suddenly winners in four of their last five games. It’s their best stretch of baseball since the season was just 5-10 games old and it’s being led by the likes of Kyle Garlick, Trevor Larnach, Miguel Sano and Alex Kirilloff.

Tonight, it appeared as if solo homeruns by Garlick and Larnach would be enough for a relentless Matt Shoemaker and a suddenly hot bullpen to close things out. But then the baseball gods sent rain…

When play resumed, Alcala gave up a 2-run homer that surrendered the lead and what appeared to be another winnable game. But not tonight. Instead, the Minnesota bats just refused to lose. Right after giving up the lead in the top of the 8th inning, the Twins answered with six runs of their own in the bottom to regain the lead and put the game away.

It was the opposite of what 2021 Twins baseball has been so far.

Garv Sauce gets his first hit of the game right when we put our rally caps on! What are the odds?!?!@Twins | #MNTWins pic.twitter.com/cb4ZC1CLZK

— Bally Sports North (@BallySportsNOR) May 25, 2021

Start of a historic turnaround?

I’m not here to get anyone excited and that’s why this blog starts with “don’t look now”. You shouldn’t look at the MLB standings yet. Even after tonight’s victory, the Twins are still 11 games below .500 and 9 games back of 1st place in the AL Central. Is this the start of a historic turnaround?

Probably not… but winning four of five games is much better news than anything else that’s come out of Target Field so far this summer. On top of that, tonight kicked off a stretch of 13 games against the Royals and Orioles, both of whom have struggled of late. If a turnaround is going to happen, it needs to start now.

Eric Strack | Minnesota Sports Fan

The Minnesota Vikings pulled out a huge victory on Sunday over the Carolina Panthers and the win kept their 2020-21 NFL playoff hopes alive. To aid them in their comeback, the Bears took a dive vs the Packers on Sunday night, moving the Vikings up to 8th place in the NFC playoff standings.

Now, the (5-6) purple sit just one game behind the (6-5) Arizona Cardinals, who hold the 7th and final playoff position.

* SOS: Strength of Schedule| SOV: Strength of Victory

It’s hard to know whether or not the Vikings can snag a playoff spot by the end of next weekend. If they were to win and the Cardinals were to lose, both teams would be tied at 6-6. Since the two teams haven’t played each other, the first tiebreaker would go to conference record, where they’d be tied at 4-4, in this scenario.

Next week’s opponent is Jacksonville (AFC) and Arizona will play the 7-4, LA Rams (NFC). Minnesota’s game won’t have bearing on their record in the NFC but a loss for the Cardinals would drop them to 4-4. That means we’d go to the next tiebreaker (strength of victory).

A win vs the Jags would actually hurt the Vikings’ “strength of victory” because they’re that bad down in Florida right now. It’s impossible to know how far they would drop though, until next week is played and the SOV numbers are adjusted for both teams. No matter, the Vikings would be tied for that 7th and final place in the NFC playoff bracket, with 4 games left to play.

COVID Cancellations Help Vikings..

When the NFL and the Players’ Association finally came to an agreement on the details of this weird coronavirus-laced season, there was one major playoff clause folded inside.

If the NFL has to cancel games that have playoff implications, they will add an 8th team to each conference’s bracket. The Vikings currently sit at #8 in the NFC playoff standings so that would push them into the field of 16.

We are a long way from this happening, though. The NFL has built week 18 into their schedule, just in case they need to add time for makeup games. To this point, the league has played all of its scheduled games (as long as this week plays out by Tuesday) so the COVID situation would have to get really lopsided for the 16-team playoff to become a realistic future.

Here’s how NFL.com reported on it:

NFL owners unanimously approved a contingency plan to expand the playoff field from 14 to 16 teams if meaningful games cannot be played due to COVID-19, NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero reported. In the event the league is forced to take such action, it will not re-seed teams, according to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.

This proposed scenario would only become a reality if the league cannot first complete the meaningful games rescheduled in a possible Week 18. Essentially, playoff expansion will only come about as a third option in the event the league cannot complete the 256-game season as scheduled within 17 weeks or within 18 weeks, with the 18th week added solely to complete the 256-game schedule prior to postseason play.

NFL.com

Remaining Schedule

The Vikings’ remaining schedule keeps looking easier with every week that goes by… but we all know what happens when we get too confident here in Minnesota.

After the Jaguars’ game next Sunday, the purple will finish their 2020 schedule @ Tampa Bay, vs Chicago, @ New Orleans and @ Detroit. I don’t even think the Bucs know who they are right now. That team looked lost in the first half vs the Chiefs Sunday, but then stormed back and pulled the game within a field goal by the time the dust settled.

We all know who Chicago and Detroit are (shit). New Orleans was the other tough game still on the schedule but Sean Payton isn’t the same without Drew Brees.

Fun

No matter what happens the rest of this season, I’m having way more fun in week 12 than I ever could have imagined a month ago, when we were trying to tank for Trevor and fire Mike Zimmer.

Eric Strack | Minnesota Sports Fan